Slashdot Mirror
Academic Criticism of ESR's The Cathedral & The Bazaar
Gorgonzola sent us the linkage to First Monday's critique of [ESR]'s The Cathedral and The Bazaar. C&B is criticized academically, cited as being an oversimplified view of OSS, as well as a distortion of reality. Well-written critique, and one that should provoke discussion.
ESR has often complained about being flamed rather than being given constructive criticism (e.g., the Bruce Perens/ESR dispute), so I simply have to wonder.. Exactly how will he react to criticism like this, which is much more academic in nature?
Of course, the reason why this comes to mind is because of a post in a previous discussion (I believe regarding ESR's answers to the questions posed by Slashdot) that suggested that flaming ESR was pointless because it would engender an attitude in him along the lines of "no, you don't understand. I'm right, you're wrong, so get out of my way".
~ Kish
Well here's my take after reading the whole thing...
:)
.sig)
,hacker Perl another Just)'
This doesn't seem to be a critique of CatB at all - more squarely aimed at the open source concept in general.
However... It's just a nice collection of articles, writings and statements we've seen and argued about before. I've seen nothing new here. What I do see is a lot of stuff from a few individuals who've had a bad experience with OSS - or even who've pointed out weaknesses in the model (and yet often pointed out solutions - a fact this article doesn't cover). We've all seen the writings of Ritchie and Zawinski on this subject - often well thought out, sometimes flawed.
There's a bit in there about development models - how patches to Linux get rejected and waste developer time causing bad feeling. But someone should go and read Linus' statements on the ISDN stuff from the kernel dev list - they are very clear as to why sometimes good patches get rejected. That's just the nature of the beast. However it doesn't amount to wasted time. Those patches don't vanish in a poof of smoke - they could be integrated better (or written better - whatever is applicable) later. Even on commercial projects you don't always get your code included just because you spent a 3 months writing it (voice of experience here...).
Yes, it's a good article covering a lot of pitfalls of open source development. Yes, it's a horribly flawed article. No, open source isn't a panacea - that doesn't exist (unless you're in s/w marketing).
Move along - nothing to see here.
(really need to change this
perl -e 'print scalar reverse q(\)-:
Matt. Want XML + Apache + Stylesheets? Get AxKit.
The fundamental problem with the whole "Open Source is communism" argument is this.
If you create a widget and give it away, you lose the widget.
If you create a program and give it away, you don't lose the software.
This is difference fundamentally effects the economics of software.
Now people like to talk about "lost sales" as a sort of loss similar to giving away a physical object, but in reality this is rarely the case. If you look at the success of "Linux" vs. the success of "Minix", it is pretty clear that the "lost sales" experienced by Linus in giving away his product for free were minimal. Had he attempted to sell it, it would have failed. Given the noteriety he has gained, I do not doubt that from a purely self-interested standpoint, he was better off in the long run giving it away. I suspect this is true for a lot of Open Source authors.
The cake is a pie
This is an interesting polemic, well-written and thought provoking for the OS community. However, I would have to respectfully disagree with the statement that it is an "academic" (that is, of or from the academy) criticism.
;-).
Reason: no footnoted arguments from, or references to, any academic literature from the last 200 years or so in the areas of economics, political economy, business (evil MBA stuff), or software engineering. No reference (that is, detailed references with footnotes) to current or past theory in these areas. No cited quotations from academic journals. And finally, no obtuse, buzzword-driven jargon
Now, opinions may differ on the value of academic research and publishing, particularly in areas such as economics and business. However, there is a fairly well-established framework for presenting an idea to one's peers for scrutiny in an academic sense, and this essay doesn't follow that framework.
Personally, I think it would be helpful if both ESR's CatB argument and some counter-arguments _were_ written up in this format and hashed out in , say, the Journal of Political Economy. YMMV may vary on that thought, of course. But this essay isn't that.
sPh
This paper is FUD at its worst. Bezroukov first numbs the reader with several statements that rely on links for support rather than explaining the points made in those links: e.g. "(see Jamie Zawinski's letter)"
... "its [sic] a moving target that never really gets out of beta."
;-)
Bezroukov's point is often unclear, which may be why he just throws in quotes from others. He even contradicts himself about the payback for OSS developers:
"Who will be rewarded financially for the enormous open source effort? Burnout of OSS leaders like Linus Torvalds is all too common to ignore."
followed later by:
"In both science and programming,those involved aren't in it for the money. Most of the OSS developers are doing it to chase a dream, not to build up their bank balances."
More pap:
"A casual trip through cyberspace will turn up evidence of hostility, selfishness, and simple nonsense."
Welcome to the world of free speech - this is why we have moderators.
"Linux isn't secure and it isn't stable," my informant writes,
WHAT???? Linux is much more like a constantly improving work toward the goals recognized by the majority of its developers. No, wait - it's
exaclty like that.
"Although people are physically separated, they all are working toward a common and important goal. That fuels the Linux movement."
Yes, it does. If Bezroukov understands this, why spend so much time crying about the "problems" of the open source movement? Why try to shoot down Linus with the anticipation of burnout or authoritarian rule? Oh, yeah - it's FUD.
Open source is a completely new progressive phenomenon (bright future of mankind) with no analogs in history.
I find nothing within CatB that suggests this. As a matter of fact, I found the following which would seem to refute it:
Strike oneAll open source projects are the same and employ the so-called "bazaar model"
CatB definitely does not say this. Here's a quote:
That is, no open-source project ever starts out being developed in bazaar style. In fact, just about every project starts out as the work of a single individual. Eric recognized this, but this Nikolai person somehow misinterpreted the paper.Strike two
Microsoft needs to be destroyed.
I searched CatB for the term Microsoft. Not once is it mentioned that Microsoft needs to be destroyed.
Strike three
I couldn't read any further. If his entire paper is based on the fact that he somehow attributes these "postulates" to Eric's paper, then his entire paper is based on flawed assumptions.
Either this character really dislikes ESR (why did he say Eric had a "vulgar Marxist" interpretation of the phenomenon?), or he's simply attacking a famous person to whip up some publicity of his own (very likely).
99 little bugs in the code, 99 bugs in the code,
fix one bug, compile it again...
I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar.
When I learned science at school, which feels like a long time ago (but in reality isn't), we learned that if the premise upon which you're trying to prove something is wrong then the proof itself must also be wrong.
:)
,hacker Perl another Just)'
The premise of this discussion seems to be the points at the top of the article - none of which I see exactly touted in CatB (although I'm sure ESR leans towards some of the points). The article makes out ESR to be an open source fundamentalist. I think he's anything but a fundamentalist - ESR by his many discussions in the past can be shown very clearly to be a pragmatist.
Nowhere in CatB does ESR state that the Bazaar model is a silver bullet (IIRC it very carefully states that it is _not_ a silver bullet). Nowhere does it state that open source is an ideal community without disagreement (IIRC it states that disagreements are out in the open and so you'd better be right on your point or smarter people will show you to be wrong).
I think criticism of CatB is important. I don't think open source is a silver bullet. But I think the premise of this article is wrong.
Now I'm going to go read the rest of it
Matt.
perl -e 'print scalar reverse q(\)-:
Matt. Want XML + Apache + Stylesheets? Get AxKit.
So much in this article was negative, and I sensed a political agenda in it. Particularly repeated comparisons (of Open Source) to Communism and Socialism, apparently to inspire faulty logic like the following:
Open source is like Communism.
Communism failed.
Therefore, open source is doomed to failure.
The conclusion does not neccesarily follow from the arguments... even if we accept that both arguments are true (not everyone will).
There was also a comparison to Lysenkoism. Now Lysenkoism is a politicized (Stalinist, to be precise) version of Lamarckism, which proposed that acquired characteristics could be inherited by subsequent generations. It was wrong. It doesn't work, as thousands of starving Siberians could attest. It doesn't work for living things. Genetics simply doesn't work that way. But DNA code is fundamentally different from binary code. Acquired characteristics can be "inherited" by later, improved versions of binary code. Using the loaded word "Lysenkoism" in describing open source is misleading at best, and deliberately misleading at worst.
As I stated above, I detect a political agenda.
I don't think this essay is an example of particularly cogent criticism. It consists largely of a series of quotes that appear to lend credence to a series of opinions about the nature of "Open Source," but it is well thought out and lucid. I know it is declasse to bring it up, but I found the the spelling and punctuation errors a serious distraction.
All of that said, however, I think we (meaning the human race) need to do a great deal more thinking then discussing how we organize our labor for personal and community gain. As an example of that phenomenon I enjoyed the essay a great deal.
I, too, think that much of the current thought on free software and open source is somewhat utopian and idealisitc, but I think that is a good thing. Reality will always modify theory, but to change reality requires ideas that lie beyond attainability. I don't think one can dismiss ESR's ideas merely because they will never become reality -- they have and will continue to change the limits of reality, even if they are never fully attainable.
My own personal belief (and, I will admit, slightly utopian hope) is that the economic need for commerical software has ceased to exist. Instead I think programmers will work as professionals (like lawyers and doctors), paid for their knoweldge and skill. Because production and distribution of software can now be done at nearly zero cost, there is no longer any need for companies to produce shrink-wrapped software.
Given that, I think the work started by RMS, and considerably furthered by Linus, Alan, et. al., will continue -- programmers writing code they want to write and then giving it away. That fits the "scientific research" view of the author of the essay discussed here.
I do, however, also think that companies will begin to use and need such software. As they do so, they will have specific needs that are not addressed by that "research software." These companies will pay programmers (as professionals, not employees) to produce those programs. We professionals will insist that such programs be open source/free software -- contributed back to the professional community.
I use surgery as an example. When a doctor (perhaps employed in a univeristy hospital) develops a new surgical technique, he or she does not keep it a secret and then package and sell it to other doctors (Triple Bypass 98?), instead it is published in a medical journal and taught to other doctors. The discovering doctor becomes more valuable, gains prestige, brings contributions to his or her hospital, etc. No economic disaster is portends. Quite the reverse.
Please note that I believe this applies to software only, (or to technique only). The analogy does not extend to drugs or medical devices because these DO have considerable manufacturing costs -- they are not zero cost distributable.
I'm very glad to see discussion such as this essay, and I hope to see more of it.
One perceived difference is that many OSS developers do it for the love of coding. This misses the point that many scientists work for exactly the same reason. I could double my salary if I left science, and have spent more than one year working with no income at all, living off savings, just to stay in the field.